1. Clearly defined contents and boundaries of the resource and exclusion of
external untitled parties;
2. The appropriation and provision of common resources that are adapted to local
conditions;
3. Collective-choice arrangements that allow most resource appropriators to participate in the decision-making process;
4. Effective monitoring by monitors who are part of or accountable to the
appropriators;
5. A scale of graduated sanctions for resource appropriators who violate community rules;
6. Mechanisms of conflict resolution that are cheap and of easy access;
7. Self-determination of the community recognized by higher-level authorities; and
8. In the case of larger common pool resources, organization in the form of
multiple layers of nested enterprises, with small local CPRs at the base level.
The design principles can be further broken down into primary and secondary
factors while understanding community groundwater management in India. At the
same time, it becomes important to note the common features of experiences in both
Community Management Responses to groundwater in rural India (COMMAN
2005) and the evolving experience in Participatory Groundwater Management
(PGWM) from different parts of India (ACWADAM 2014; Ghose et al. 2018).
These are listed below:
• Both community approaches and PGWM empower communities to make
informed choices around the question of rural water security.
• Groundwater management is not necessarily interpreted in terms of developing
locally agreed controls.
• Symptoms and responses to groundwater problems, especially depletion, vary
despite underlying common causes.
• Measures to augment groundwater are more acceptable than those to conserve it.
• Hydrogeological advice may help assess the risk of losing conservation gains.
• The limitations of state’s interventions for regulating groundwater use through
punitive measures can be circumvented to a large extent by enabling communities to make informed choices—such as instances of banning and regulating
the depth of new borewells, shifts in cropping pattern, sharing of borewells, etc.
• The incongruence between scales of groundwater management and aquifer
dynamics along with the issue of exclusion of certain stakeholders from the
management group are the central challenges to the development of
community-based organizations for groundwater management.
• The heterogeneity of communities remains a big challenge in achieving success
in participatory, community-driven groundwater management, especially in
regional aquifer systems.
• Dealing with large externalities such as urbanization, energy incentives and
land-use changes is the biggest challenge for efforts in community-based
groundwater management, not to mention the difficulty in incentivizing peoples’
participation on groundwater management, through public policy instruments.
Catalysing Groundwater Governance Through People’s …
15
external untitled parties;
2. The appropriation and provision of common resources that are adapted to local
conditions;
3. Collective-choice arrangements that allow most resource appropriators to participate in the decision-making process;
4. Effective monitoring by monitors who are part of or accountable to the
appropriators;
5. A scale of graduated sanctions for resource appropriators who violate community rules;
6. Mechanisms of conflict resolution that are cheap and of easy access;
7. Self-determination of the community recognized by higher-level authorities; and
8. In the case of larger common pool resources, organization in the form of
multiple layers of nested enterprises, with small local CPRs at the base level.
The design principles can be further broken down into primary and secondary
factors while understanding community groundwater management in India. At the
same time, it becomes important to note the common features of experiences in both
Community Management Responses to groundwater in rural India (COMMAN
2005) and the evolving experience in Participatory Groundwater Management
(PGWM) from different parts of India (ACWADAM 2014; Ghose et al. 2018).
These are listed below:
• Both community approaches and PGWM empower communities to make
informed choices around the question of rural water security.
• Groundwater management is not necessarily interpreted in terms of developing
locally agreed controls.
• Symptoms and responses to groundwater problems, especially depletion, vary
despite underlying common causes.
• Measures to augment groundwater are more acceptable than those to conserve it.
• Hydrogeological advice may help assess the risk of losing conservation gains.
• The limitations of state’s interventions for regulating groundwater use through
punitive measures can be circumvented to a large extent by enabling communities to make informed choices—such as instances of banning and regulating
the depth of new borewells, shifts in cropping pattern, sharing of borewells, etc.
• The incongruence between scales of groundwater management and aquifer
dynamics along with the issue of exclusion of certain stakeholders from the
management group are the central challenges to the development of
community-based organizations for groundwater management.
• The heterogeneity of communities remains a big challenge in achieving success
in participatory, community-driven groundwater management, especially in
regional aquifer systems.
• Dealing with large externalities such as urbanization, energy incentives and
land-use changes is the biggest challenge for efforts in community-based
groundwater management, not to mention the difficulty in incentivizing peoples’
participation on groundwater management, through public policy instruments.
Catalysing Groundwater Governance Through People’s …
15